On quarterback play:“Mike (Rocco) did a good job coming in and making some throws there, leading us to a scoring drive. He’s a competitor, and I wouldn’t doubt he’d do anything else than try to give us his absolute best effort and a chance to try to win the game there at the end. I thought we ran the ball well. We tried make some throws for Phillip (Sims) to have success with some completions, and just didn’t get it done with the completions. It’s unfortunate. You start the game out in a hole like we did and trying to come back and dig yourself out of the hole and come up short.”

On opening kickoff:“We should never let up and run through the end zone when the ball is kicked. We knew that Diggs was a special player, a dynamic player. Your job is to run down on the kickoffs and cover the kickoffs. Regardless of what you think someone is doing, that’s what we’re supposed to do and obviously we didn’t do it.”

On penalties:“Last game, we had around six penalties and that is still six too many. I don’t know how many we got this game. I think there’s five or six again. Again, the ones like personal fouls that happen after the scrimmage play are the silly ones. The message will continue getting preached to these guys. As I said before, the guys who getthese multiple penalties that are post-snap plays won’t be playing. I don’t know. I’ll have to look at the penalties and who they were called on, if there were multiple offenders of that. Either way, penalties are not acceptable and not good, particularly if they continue drives or thwart drives. After three weeks ago and 16 penalties, which is unacceptable, then last week and this week, our goal is to minimize those penalties or anything that causes you to not move the ball forward offensively or allow them to continue drives.”

On special teams:“Obviously when you run a kickoff back for a touchdown, that’s not good. One of their guys got a hand on a field goal. We’ll hopefully address it with Ian Frye coming in and I believe he made all of his extra points. Those are the things that continually have to be evaluated by our coaches: who’s doing it and if they’re doing it well. If they’re not doing it, we need to make sure we can give an individual an opportunity to play well and give us a chance. It will be no different looking at this tape again to see if there’s something scheme-wise or something player-wise that has to be addressed. We will do that.”

On Kevin Parks:“Kevin is another one of those guys who is a competitor. He never wants to come out of the game. That’s kind of the guy he is. He’s an asset to this team. When you have guys like him, talented backs like him, you want to find ways to get him the ball. I think he just got into a groove here today being a downhill runner, making guys miss, running with his shoulder pads over his feet, being physical. Those are thethings that Kevin gives us when he’s in the game.”

On incomplete pass to end final drive and missed opportunities:“It’s kind of indicative of the season with these plays at the most opportune times that are not being made. It was one of those things where with outstretched fingertips, he would still be running if we made that play. It’s disappointing for things to occur as we saw: the long touchdown on the kickoff return. Diggs is an excellent receiver for them. That’s four catches for 89 yards, and one 60-yarder. We talk about reducing our turnovers. Of course we were cost one, and then we finally get a turnover. That’s the kind of thing that we need to happen to us. Not enough good things happened to us today at the end to pull this thing out. Great effort by these guys, but great effort doesn’t end the result with a W. It’s still a loss. We need to get better with that.”

On five-game losing streak:“My goal is to make sure I coach and teach, be a role model, be a mentor, understand these guys’obligations in the classroom and in the community. We want to play well on the field, and we will play well on the field. I’ll continue to build goodwill because this University deserves it. We’re going through some adversity here on the football field. That’s what happens. The worst thing we could do now is start pointing fingers and blaming and things like that. I will continue towork as hard as I can to make sure that this team and the players have an opportunity to be successful players once they finish playing, and get themcoached up the way they need to be coached up. That’s making sure the coaches are accountable. We hope you get a chance to look at all aspects of what’s going on with this program, off the field, on the field and in the classroom. I understand that we live in a culture of wins and losses and things like that. It’s not from a lack of effort or a lack of trying. I understand that. I am more resolved and resolute to help these young men experience success on the field, as they are in other areas of their life.”